Every Day Different

Saturday night I was walking to Dylan's. She had invited me to join her and three young Italian friends in the making of summer rolls. She would provide the rice paper and sprouts, the plum sauce and beef-ginger filling. I was the bearer of fresh mint leaves. Essential ingredient.

The air was summer cool. My feet hit the sidewalk, flat-soled ballerinas. I rounded the corner of Stubbenkammer Strasse. Without warning, I felt suddenly, startlingly strong.

I was hollowed out, but grounded. Wrung dry, but clarion.

I thought, A hurricane could come now, could raze the walls of these buildings, red brick could tumble round my ankles. And I would stay standing.

I thought, So this is what this time will make me -- these relentless months, caged by illness, fatigue's breath in my bones, limbs virus-addled, mind a soup, and then, just as I was lifting my head, just as my blood seemed to quicken, the swift-shock loss of love. My best friend my lover my playmate my anchor my sail my soul, gone to me. For good.

Wise, I thought, the trials of my body would make me. Deep, I thought, the flailing of this heart. But strong? That I had not anticipated.

It felt pretty good.

Today I sat before my laptop at Cafe MaiBach. My intention: write a synopsis of the memoir to pitch it to an agent. I was blinking at the screen. There was just No Way. I was the razed buildings. I was the red brick, crumbled and riven. The cry was in my lungs. I gulped down the still water, paid the waitress, hurried into the sun.

I thought, I will lie in the park, I will stare at the clouds, this will calm me.

I found a bench beneath the trees. The sky was pretty blue. The clouds were puffy. The wind was strong, the leaves brushed and jostled -- the shush-shush-shush of soft bodies.

I heard. I saw. I felt. And it did not matter. I was in battle. My mind flinging itself at what my heart can't comprehend. One conversation after another. With him.

The sun vanished, the breeze chilled my skin. I left. Stopped at the bank. Bought cat food.

By the time I reached my flat, the grief had me bunched up, doubled over. Inside out and upside down, dangling by my ankles.

I did not feel strong. Not even a little.

I thought, I can never leave the sofa. I called my mother. "I'm having a" --my voice broke-- "hard day."

Oh, Schatz, she said, I know, I know. I wish I could be there. I wish I could change it.

I said, Life is asking too much of me. I just can't do it.

I cried very hard. I cried very long. I cried until there was no more crying. Until the next hour seemed like it might be livable. Even the next two.

My mother said, Your father, he crossed my path just as my other love was dying, just as I thought there could never be another. What happened to me gives me such hope. I know you can't imagine it now, but...

Also she said, Your heart was big, Schatz. And that is always good.

Comments

[Julie @ the calm before the stork]

go mom! wise words.

you are beauty and grace.

sending love!

[Lilan]

Sometimes Moms just really come through! And it reminds me of the wonderful email you wrote me -- "Your love is as big as the sky.... Loving big benefits you, first and always." That made me feel so good.
xoxox
L